


Re-Crossing The Rainbow Bridge

by CourageousPineapple



Category: Bohemian Rhapsody (Movie 2018), Queen (Band)
Genre: Gen, Rainbow Bridge
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-20
Updated: 2020-07-20
Packaged: 2021-03-04 22:09:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 504
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25393639
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CourageousPineapple/pseuds/CourageousPineapple
Summary: Delilah the cat hears the album "Made In Heaven" for the first time.
Comments: 7
Kudos: 12





	Re-Crossing The Rainbow Bridge

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Birthday Brian!

Delilah was startled from her nap by the outside gate’s monitor chiming. Go back to sleep or see who wanted in? Then there were voices unheard for a long time: Brimi and Rog, her beloved Person Freddie had called them. Decision made, she followed them to the Great Room. She rarely went there. It made her miss her Freddie too much, who had crossed the Rainbow Bridge sixteen cat years or four human years ago.

Brimi was standing by the record player. Rog was sitting on the couch, with her current Person Mary in an armchair. John wasn't with them. 

“We thought you should hear it before it was released,” Brimi said, putting on a record. An instrumental part began, slowly swelling in volume, then birds, a piano, and... 

Her Freddie! It was her Freddie’s voice, singing! He was singing words she had never heard him sing! 

Delilah ran around the room, meowing. Where was he? She couldn’t find him, but he kept singing to her about a beautiful day, and how no-one would stop him now. She wanted to see him so much. She wanted him to pick her up, to pet her, to kiss her. But only his voice had somehow returned across the Rainbow Bridge. 

She curled up against a speaker, pressed as close as she could, his beloved voice passing through her. His body wasn’t here, but his soul was. She basked in the warmth of its flames, gentle against her fur. 

The fourth song was filled with deep emotion. Mary was crying quietly as the words washed over them. 

_“But my heart is heavy, and my hope is gone.”_

_“I don’t want pity, just a safe place to hide.”_

_“I long for peace before I die.”_

_“Mother love.”_

There was a guitar bridge, then the last verse was sung by Brimi, not her Freddie. After a short audio montage, including clips of a famous “Ay-Oh” improvisation, of “Going Back”, of a baby crying, Roger lifted the needle from the record. 

“He was too tired to do the last verse that day,” Brimi explained, his eyes damp with tears. “He said he’d come back to finish it, but...” 

“But he never returned to the studio,” Rog completed. After a long moment, Roger set back down the needle, and another song began. 

After several more songs, the final song was a reprise of the first, and then her Freddie said “Yeah.” The record ended with few seconds of the same instrumentals from the record’s beginning. It repeated until Roger got up and lifted the needle. The magic was over. 

“Thank you,” Mary said at last. 

“You’re welcome,” Brimi responded. 

The humans continued to talk, but Delilah stopped listening. Instead, she replayed those magical forty-eight minutes in her mind. She listened to songs she had never heard, and songs she had heard many times that were reworked, and through it all, she purred and purred and purred, because now she knew the truth. Each time his music played, her Freddie was reborn. 

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I have no idea if Brian, Roger, or John ever brought Mary Austin an advance copy of “Made In Heaven”, or if she has even heard it at all. This story came about because I'm on a role-play/fiction/non-fiction site called Pan Historia, and there was a contest to write a 200-500 word story with a phoenix in it (literal or metaphorical). This idea occurred to me the day after the contest ended, and it wouldn’t let go of me. So here it is, the entry I *should* have written for that contest.


End file.
